Tuesday, March 27, 2012

From Comics to Toons: Savage Dragon (1995)

It is one of Image Comics' most enduring and successful properties. Erik Larsen's Savage Dragon made the transition to television in 1995, airing on the USA Cartoon Express until the anthology was cancelled in 1996, right along with the Dragon.

Set in Chicago, the series follows the title hero, who is also serving as a police officer in the Second City. Lacewood Productions, which took over animating Problem Child for its final season as we documented last time, handled the animation for this series as well, on behalf of Universal. Following is the opening:

26 episodes were made, meaning that Savage Dragon had been more successful as an animated entity than fellow Image properties WildC.A.T.S., The Maxx, & Spawn. Larsen has continued the comic book since the cartoon's end, but the vision has long since moved away from the original concept. Something that happens to be problematic in comics in general for a number of reasons. Today, one must assume that since there hasn't been a DVD release of the series as of this writing, Larsen may be holding the rights and is unwilling to authorize a release.